Someone gave a very logical explanation for the use of African on one of the other threads this morning. I’ve been trying to find it but can’t. Hawaii said they use whatever the parents tell them - there were several classifications for race that were in use in KENYA, and African was one of them. If that’s the way O Sr. self-identified it’s more than likely that’s what they were told and why they used it.
That in itself raises some rather interesting questions. First, it should be noted that Hawaii and Alaska tended to use race as a classification ways generally not found in the other states. That said, you have to ask who supplied the information which went into the blank space for race? Was it the family, or was it the attending physician or another official?
If the person who supplied the information was an attending physician or other official, it would appear they would be ignorant of a customary Kenyan usage of the African term as a descriptor for race.
If the father was not present at the birth, it is also a stretch of the imagination that any member of the Dunham family or the mother would be acquainted with the Kenyan usage of the term, especially since the mother was supposed to be studying anthropology as a career choice. Now, that is not to say it is impossible, but it does appear to be implausible at first glance.
If the current Certificate of Live Birth and the previous Certification of Live Birth were forgeries, and/or they were based upon a fraudulent birth registration filed by the grandmother to conceal birth in a foreign nation, it seems unlikely the grandmother and her family would be acquainted with the usage of the term used by the Obama family in Kenya. Again, it is not impossible, but it is implausible enough to warrant attention.